MY BLUEBIRDS
Early in December, 1914, my brother and I cut down an old half-dead apple-tree, and on it we found a partly hollow log that the English Sparrows had evidently used for years. As I had my eye out for bird-houses, I confiscated it and finished hollowing it out. It made three log-nests, all of which have been used by bird tenants since then. On February 17, I put up two of the logs on the bank of the Ohio River, at a distance of 40 feet from our house, where they could easily be observed from nine different windows.
The site was ideal for a bird’s nest. Below, 127 feet, the Ohio rolled majestically by, flushed with the melted snow that the spring rains brought from the mountains, and dotted here and there with floating cakes of ice. The other bank of the river rose 329 feet above the level of the water. It was heavily wooded and an ideal place for all kinds of birds. As this is right in the path of the Mississippi Migration Route, one could hear the “honk, honk,” of Canada Geese, the talking notes of the Old Squaw, and once the maniacal laughter of a Loon, as it followed the Ohio to the mouth of the Beaver River, there probably resting and continuing its journey up the Beaver to its northern nesting-ground. Below, I give the dates of the important events in the Bluebirds’ history.
| February 17. Nest-logs put up. February 25. First Bluebird seen. February 28. Three pairs looked at both logs, fought for them, and my pair rented it. March 21. Nest completed. March 26. First egg laid. | March 27. Second egg laid. March 28. Third egg laid. March 29. Fourth egg laid. March 30. Fifth egg laid. April 13. Young hatched. April 29. Young left the nest. |
Prior to March 29, the river bank had been burned over twice for the purpose of improving the grass roots, but the Bluebirds never seemed to mind it, although the nest was enveloped in clouds of thick smoke both times. The last two days of March, and the first two of April were cold, below freezing, with a driving snowstorm followed by sleet; but the Bluebirds’ activities never ceased. At this time the male passed the night in the nest with the female, ‘twinkling’ into the log at sunset. The male was very pugnacious, and seemed not to know fear. He would dash with equal courage at a Flicker or a Song Sparrow, when they approached his tree. Once I saw him actually knock a Flicker off a branch. Perhaps he would not have succeeded had the Flicker been aware of his approach, but the Bluebird came up behind and hit him below the belt. When I would go near the nest, the male would utter ‘chuckling’ notes, as if to scold and frighten me away. On several occasions he came so close that I could almost touch him.
When the young were about four days old, I set up my camera, three feet away from the nest, to obtain some pictures. The first time the shutter snapped, the female hopped down on to the branch on which the camera was placed, put her head to one side, and seemed to say, “What is this that clicks in my face,” and then she hopped all over it, pecking it.
GOING HOME
Photographed by W. R. Boulton, Jr.
Both parents were often seen cleaning the nest. They began to feed the young at about eight o’clock every morning, and continued it steadily at an average of every six or seven minutes until about six at night, using as food almost exclusively a certain kind of bug that was very hairy, brownish with black markings, and, except for the hair, might have been mistaken for castor beans, being about the same size. They seemed a huge mouthful for a young Bluebird. Several times a day I would climb up to the nest and whistle softly like a Bluebird before the aperture. The young would crane their necks and stretch their mouths for the supposed food, although none was forthcoming.
